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After a hiatus which appeared to indicate that Renaissance had run their course as a band, in 1981 Michael Dunford, Annie Haslam and Jon Camp decided to give it another go. They brought in keyboard player Peter Gosling and drummer Peter Barron to complete the line up, and set about recording "Camera Camera". The band signed up with IRS records run by Miles Copeland (father of Stewart Copeland, one time of Curved Air, but better know for his work with the Police). Sadly, the results were very disappointing. While the absence of the band's traditional orchestration and the desire to explore a different direction was understandable, the lack of inspiration was not.

The signs are not good from the sleeve images, which have an unfortunate resemblance to "Love beach"; mullets, hairspray and all. Interestingly, although the line up lists five band members, only the trio of Haslam, Camp and Dunford appear in the photos, a faulty camera perhaps?

The opening title track could actually have been a decent Renaissance number, had it benefited from the symphonic arrangements of their previous work. Instead we have staccato synthesisers, and Annie doing an impression of Sonja Kirstina doing an impression of Kate Bush, with a splash of Toyah Wilcox-Fripp thrown in for good measure. She certainly demonstrates here though that her extraordinary range has not diminished.

Songs such as "Tyrant-tula" (a pun in case its not obvious) have definite echoes of "Scherezade", but are all the while marred by the jumpy disco type rhythm. It really is a pity, because the potential is there for a decent album.

In fairness, "Jigsaw" does have some of the qualities which long term fans of the band yearn for, with spirited orchestration and a reasonably varied structure. Hopes are however quickly dashed when the track comes to an abrupt halt, to be replaced by a quite awful piece of repetitive euro-pop "Running away from you". Things conclude on a brighter note with "Ukraine ways", which features some decent guitar and piano.

Peter Gosling, who was brought in to replace John Tout on keyboards, should clearly not be blamed for the 80's keyboards sounds which dominate the album, this was now the sound of choice of the band. On occasions, we are teased by echoes of the great songs of the past, and in fairness some tracks are actually decent Renaissance numbers. The problem therefore lies in the overall feel of the album. I do not however wish to completely discourage those who enjoy the music of this fine band from giving "Camera Camera" a listen, but it is wise to approach with some trepidation.

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